My father’s father did not see his first-born son until more than a year after his birth.

Stationed in the Pacific Theater of Operations during the Second Great War, he saw time in the Philippines and was one of the thousands in 1945 who would have been part of the main assault force on mainland Japan. Casualties were estimated to have been in the millions had the Americans attacked mainland Japan as the last effort to end a war that had started almost four years earlier.

Sean P. Murphy is Web editor. He can be reached at smurphy@vicksburgpost.com.

They did not attack Japan with ground forces. Two atomic bombs dropped on two Japanese cities brought the world conflict to an end.

More than 400,000 Americans paid the ultimate sacrifice while beating back the forces of tyranny and evil in two theaters on opposite sides of the globe.

My father’s father, like so many in the Greatest Generation, has moved beyond this world. Each day, age takes more and more of the heroes we should remember every day.

On Wednesday, the 11th day of the 11th month at 11 a.m. in Memorial Rose Garden in downtown Vicksburg, veterans alive and dead from that war and wars before and since will be honored. The Rose Garden should be overflowing with people, but likely won’t be.

Veterans Day does not carry the fanfare of the Fourth of July with its fireworks displays. It rarely is the tail-end of a three-day weekend, which sorrowfully means it’s no more than the remembrance itself. It is as important as those, however.

Where would we be as a country without them? Would I be able to sit here in front of this keyboard and type my own thoughts unencumbered? Would you be able to speak freely without them?

It is doubtful.

These men and women — all those remaining from the Great War to all those who returned from Vietnam only to be spat upon to the men and women currently serving — should be honored.

America’s veterans deserve a thank you. They deserve to know that those who did not serve cherish what the heroes have done under the banner of freedom.

On the 11th day of the 11th month at 11 in the morning at the Rose Garden on Monroe Street, we have an opportunity to do just that.

Two simple words is all it will take.

Thank you.